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Addie gave a tremulous smile, and he lowered his mouth to hers in a soft as air kiss, lifting off again to look down at her. ‘Sex is complicated at the best of times, but it is particularly so when two people aren’t meeting as equals in the relationship. I want us to be equally invested in everything we do together.’
‘I want that too.’ But how could she be his equal when he had sworn off ever falling in love? His heart was locked away, off limits, cordoned off because of the tragic things that had happened in his childhood. Was she being foolish to make love with him when he had already told her there was no possibility of them taking their relationship further than a short-term, perhaps only one-off event? She wasn’t experienced enough in the rules of modern dating. All she knew was she was falling in love with him. It had started the first time she had met him, and it had grown with every subsequent meeting. But it had taken spending time with him, getting to know him, seeing him for the man he was behind the playboy supersuccessful businessman persona he presented to the world. He was sensitive, deep, caring and thoughtful. How could she not fall desperately in love with him?
Vic brought his mouth back down to hers in a longer kiss this time, his tongue calling hers into sensual play. She could taste the salt and musk of her body on his lips, and it excited her in a way she had never thought possible. It added another layer of intimacy that made her feel as if something had shifted in the dynamic between them. Something unique and special that could not be so easily undone.
Vic kissed his way from her mouth back to her breasts again, his lips and tongue teasing and tantalising her. Addie was aware of his arousal hot and heavy and hard against her and marvelled at his self-control. Or was he taking his time for her sake? Making sure she didn’t feel rushed or pressured.
‘Aren’t you going to…?’ She left the sentence hanging, suddenly too shy to say the words out loud.
Vic stroked a tendril of hair away from her face, his eyes bottomless pools of black ink. ‘I want you so badly as you can probably tell, but I don’t want to rush you. I want you to be ready for me, so you don’t feel any pain.’
‘I’m ready for you,’ Addie said in a breathless whisper. ‘So, so ready.’ Hadn’t she been ready from his first kiss? Her body had responded to his like a flower does to the warmth of the sun after a bleak and bitterly cold winter.
Vic kissed her again, deeply, urgently, his hands moving over her body in strokes and caresses that sent her pulse rate soaring. But then he pulled back again, his breathing uneven. ‘I need to put on a condom.’ He shifted away from her and stood from the bed to step out of his shoes and socks and trousers and underwear. They were such mundane everyday actions but in this context of huge significance to her. He was revealing all of himself to her as she had done to him. She drank in the sight of his tanned and toned and aroused body, her heart picking up its pace at the sheer beauty of him. He was a man in the prime of his life, athletic without being overly so. Toned and taut in a healthy, not obsessive way. He took a condom out of the bedside drawer and removed it from its wrapper, deftly applying it as if he had done it a thousand times before. But then, he probablyhaddone it a thousand times before.
Addie was not aware of any change in her expression, but Vic must have read her mind, for he came back beside her, seated this time, and took one of her hands in his. He brought it up to his chest, holding it against the tum-tippy-tum-tippy-tum of his heart.
‘I know what you’re thinking.’ There was a level of gravitas to his tone.
Addie held his gaze with an effort. ‘What am I thinking?’
‘That I’ve done this a heap of times, and you’re just one woman in a long list of others who’ve shared my bed.’
Addie gave a tiny grimace. ‘Okay, so you can mind read as well as kiss like a dream.’
Vic pressed her hand a little harder to his chest, his eyes warm and tender in a way that made her heart contract. ‘This is a new experience for me, to be with someone who has never made love with anyone before.’
Addie tilted head at him. ‘Are you nervous?’
His mouth twisted in a wry smile. ‘A little.’
‘But you’re so experienced. Why would you be nervous about doing something that comes so naturally to you?’
He brought her hand up to his mouth and pressed his lips to her bent knuckles, his eyes still holding hers. ‘I want this experience to be something special, not something you look back on with regret or shame. But you have to realise this is just sex. It’s not a promise to be together for ever. You have to understand this is all I can give you.’
Right now, all Addie wanted was his body, but at the back of her mind a little voice was warning her that while this encounter would no doubt be wonderful, it wouldn’t satisfy her need for the love and acceptance she had craved all her life. It was a one-off, a box ticked, a deed done, a goal accomplished. It was not a commitment to live in harmony for the rest of their days. ‘I understand that.’ She injected her voice with as much conviction as possible. ‘This is just sex. My first, and your first with a first-timer.’
He kept her hand in his and came down on the bed beside her, propping himself up on one elbow, his long legs brushing against hers. ‘Once we do this, there’s no turning back the clock. It will permanently change our…relationship.’ His hesitation over the wordrelationshipmade her wonder if he was concerned at how they would interact in the future. Was he worried she might embarrass him by following him around like a lovesick fool? Was he worried she would want more than this one encounter? That she would want commitment, marriage, babies, a future? That whenever they were in each other’s company she might make a fool of herself fawning over him just because he had been her first lover?
‘If you’re worried I’m going to tell everyone we slept together, think again. I’m a very private person.’
‘That’s not what worries me at all.’ Vic’s voice contained a serious note, his expression reflecting his concern.
‘Are you worriedyoumight want more?’ Addie wasn’t sure why she asked such a bold question, but it came out before she could monitor her tongue.
His dark eyes were like a light flickering during a glitch in a power supply. ‘Right now, I do want more. I want you.’
And his mouth came down and set hers alight all over again.
CHAPTER NINE
Vic pressed hismouth to Addie’s and had trouble keeping a lid on his passion for her. Her lips were soft and sweet and supple and moulded to his as if made specially for him. Her tongue met his shyly at first, but then with growing confidence she kissed him back with an eroticism that threatened to blow the top of his head off.
Touching her skin was like touching the finest satin, her body was slim but curvy in the right places. And those places set him on fire. He was aching to be inside her, but he needed to take things slowly, to make sure she was adequately prepared. Being with Addie was so different from his usual hook-ups. There were even a couple of encounters where he hadn’t even bothered to remember the person’s name. It had only been about the physical release, mutual of course, because he was a giver, not a taker. Sex for him had to be a two-way deal, but it had never been this personal, intimate…undoable.
He was crossing a boundary he had never crossed before. A boundary he had never even considered until the night he had picked her up to bring her to his villa. Yes, he was aware of her infatuation with him at the engagement party and then the wedding of her brother and his half-sister, but back then it had mildly amused him. It had not been something he had thought he would ever act upon. Addie was so different from the women he dated in that she was unworldly, shy and totally unaware of how beautiful she was, not just in looks but in nature. There was a caring sweetness about her that was captivating. He had found himself telling her about his childhood, the loss of his father, the treatment of his stepfather, his difficult relationship with his mother—all things he had spoken to no one about before, not even Marcus, his closest friend. Somehow Addie had got him to open up about things he had shoved so deep inside him he had almost forgotten they were there. Almost.
Addie murmured her encouragement against his mouth and Vic deepened the kiss, breathing in the flowery scent of her hair and skin, relishing in the addictive taste of her. He moved over her, half across her body, conscious of his weight on her slighter frame. He raised himself up on his elbows either side of her body, his gaze dipping to her mouth, pink and swollen from his kisses. ‘You have such a kissable mouth.’